Adepticon - And Here We Go!

 Adepticon - And Here We Go!

Adepticon 2022 opens up on Wednesday evening and I can't wait to get there! I haven't gotten to indulge in Organized Play for Armada since before the pandemic and I'm so excited that the moment is nearly here! I wrote awhile back that I had every intention of writing about my training for Adepticon, but that sort of didn't happen. For a couple of reasons, honestly. The first is that my fleet has changed a number of times and I just didn't feel like digging into the changes each time. I knew I could always return to the build I had planned on taking to Adepticon several years ago, so trying new stuff wasn't really an issue. But another reason I didn't share the journey was because I frankly found it frustrating. I'd found quite a lot of success with the Grand Moff Tarkin fleet I was flying previously, but my success was dropping off. Some of it felt like sloppy play on my part (which was, honestly, embarrassing because I know this fleet inside and out) and some of it felt like elements that suddenly weren't working. Which, under the circumstances, didn't really make a lot of sense.

Anyway, I came up with 4 or 5 new iterations of the fleet to try out. And I just didn't want to write up the failures and successes associated with each one. There were more of the former than the latter, I was frustrated, and with other stuff going on in my life (including COVID running through my family a short while back), my frustrations doubled. There are times when I think sharing parts of my life, specifically my frustration with failure, can offer useful insight. Not just to you the reader, but to me as the writer. It's a way of reflecting and debriefing. I come up with new insight as I'm sorting my thoughts in order to put pen to paper. But there are also times when doing so basically equates to wallowing. These past couple of months would likely land in that latter camp rather than the former. Fortunately, I've got some really terrific friends with whom I could debrief about Armada in a productive way despite my inclination toward wallowing. The STL Armada community is full of folks who are happy to talk through choices, ideas, and matches. They offer feedback without having ego as to whether or not one takes the advice they offer. I had ample opportunity to be frustrated about black dice without any of my opponents taking it personally, which meant I could work my way through that frustration and disappointment without losing any friends or fellow Armada players. I also have two friends with whom I play Armada online simply because distance doesn't allow for in-person play. And I had the same experience with them as with my STL Armada community.

All of the support has proven really helpful in prep for Adepticon. Because I don't just want to be at my best from a playing perspective, but also from a personal perspective. I want to be the guy who can maintain enough distance that I offer fist bumps over a good kill scored by my opponent. I want to be the guy who can roll into 2 damage on five black dice (with no hit/crits), then roll an additional black die, roll 1 damage, then reroll 3 black dice and blank on them all (netting a grand total of 3 damage on what effectively amounts to 9 black dice; believe me, that or something strikingly similar has happened to me several times over the past couple of months), and just sigh while saying, "nothing I can do about bad dice," and believe it when I say it. People don't like to win because their opponent's dice were garbage, and it only makes them feel worse when the player whose dice failed them is incredibly upset about it. I feel as though working through some of this stuff with my friends has prepped me to be the guy I described above. In short: I'm ready to be a good opponent, regardless of how things go at Adepticon.

I realize a lot of this doesn't paint me in a flattering light. I talk about wallowing, complaining, tilting, all of the things you don't want to see in whoever is across the table from you. So why share it? Because it's human. We've all been here. I've seen the best of people turn sour under the right circumstances. We've all been there. It's okay that we have! But how we deal with it is what really makes us people worthy of being in the gaming community. Bad days are allowed; abuse of other players is not. I've not done the latter, but I've certainly had the bad days and been unpleasant. I really want to do well at Adepticon. But more importantly than that, I want to have fun and I want to be a pleasant opponent. And I'm certain I'm not the only one prioritizing in that order.

Of course, this trip to Adepticon means I won't be posting stuff on the blog until after I get back. But I've got some riffs on my Grand Moff Tarkin fleet that I look forward to sharing after Adepticon in a tournament report I plan on writing! I also plan on playing in the Armada team tournament on Sunday and the X-Wing tournament on Saturday. I've never been to Adepticon, so I look forward to attending my first. Looking forward to seeing folks from our extensive Armada family there!